


We're not lost

by mythicalpatterns



Category: Rhett & Link
Genre: Angst, Apocalypse, M/M, Minor Character Death, Tropetastic Tuesday 5, forced bed- sharing, i think there's some fluff in there somewhere
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-04-09
Updated: 2017-04-09
Packaged: 2018-10-16 21:45:09
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,749
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10580091
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/mythicalpatterns/pseuds/mythicalpatterns
Summary: One of the first things Link did when the world went to shit was to punch Rhett in the face. It just came over him all at once, and thinking back on it, there really wasn't any rational explanation. It was just the overwhelming fear and the need to blame someone.





	

**Author's Note:**

> Written for @thegreyhenleys Tropetastic Tuesdays #5: forced bed- sharing with other people around. Okay so I ended up writing this trope as some kind of apocalyptic angst. I've had a rough week and needed to process.
> 
> If you want to listen to what I listened to while writing, it's Olafur Arnalds album: "... and they have escaped the weight of darkness". It is hauntingly beautiful and sad.
> 
> DISCLAIMER: I don't know anything about radiation and very little about the geography of the states and I didn't have the time or energy to do any research. It's not that important for this story.

One of the first things Link did when the world went to shit was to punch Rhett in the face. It just came over him all at once, and thinking back on it, there really wasn't any rational explanation. It was just the overwhelming fear and the need to blame someone. And Rhett was there (like he always were) and he had, as early as last week, ranted about how prepared and excited he was for the apocalypse. In Link's mind that particular moment, when the helplessness threatened to drown him, it all added up to Rhett wishing for this and somehow making it happen. Luckily, through tear-hazed eyes, his aim wasn't the best. Rhett flinched and asked what the hell he was doing but besides a vague red mark on his chin, he went unharmed. And when Link screamed, he didn't even remember about what, Rhett's anger fell from his face. He laid his long arms around Link who struggled at first, fists beating at his chest, but the big man just kept holding him tight until Link went limp, sobbing into Rhett's shirt.

 

There was no anger in Link now. Not against Rhett, nor anyone or anything. He was too tired, too drained to feel things like that anymore. He stopped being angry at God a long time ago, settling for keeping his distance to the heavenly father, whom he'd turned to so many times in need before. If He didn't bother with Link then Link wouldn't bother with Him.

 

They had been the last one's at the studio before the summer break – him, Rhett and Stevie. Both their families had already left for North Carolina and they were gonna go all three of them the same night. Link could barely remember the initial hit or the first couple of days after. It was all just a blur of panic and smoke and people screaming and then miles and miles of vast nothingness. Muffled voices on radio- transmitters, telling them facts that chilled them to the bone, that was impossible to grasp. _This is not happening, this is a really, really bad dream._

 

But it was, and the months of walking through the burnt desert, coming upon desserted cities and communities had made it all too real. Link didn't know when Rhett'd gone quiet. At first he had been a force. With fire in his eyes, an unbending determination to _live_ to see this through, it translated in his every movement. He made up plans, thought of different options, kept Link's panic at bay and comforted Stevie when her tears silently flowed down her pale face. He did it all with a sharp and rational mind. While Link was caught up in all the emotions (hence the punch), unable to form complete thoughts – the image of Christy and his kids dancing before his eyes surging him into a spiral of anxiety that threatened to bring him to his knees. He'd clung to Rhett, like he was a steady tree in a storm.

 

When Link looked at his best friend now, all that was gone. It was as if his fire had burned out. Link could see Jessie and the boys in the newly formed lines around his eyes and the glassy-eyed stare. He only ever hummed, spoke in one- word sentences if at all. And then when the nights came – he cried. A creaky, wailing sound that cut through Link's bones with it's sharpness and utter, complete helplessness. And when Link tried to be Rhett's roots, reaching out for his hand or trying to keep him safe in an embrace, Rhett withdrew, stiffened or flinched – as if Link's touch made him hurt even more.

 

There was hope, Link told himself. There was always hope. Though a lot of it had left Link when the life of Stevie had faded away before his very eyes. They had been so close to making it, to getting her the help she needed but her body just gave up. Rhett and Link had taken turns to carry her (Link could still feel her feather- light body in his arms, her bones sharp against his skin), the last days. She had always been thin, etheral but now she looked almost see- through. Her last breath was just a light whiff of air, taking the remaining glint of light in her eyes with it.

 

Link didn't cry. He'd done so much of it in the begining. Now he didn't think he was able to if he wanted. He felt dried out. Rhett screamed. Right out into the vast waste- land, cursing god and tearing at his hair.

 

***

 

Link felt just a hint of relief when the shadow of another base appeared in their line of sight. It had been a long time since the last one. He glanced over at Rhett but his face was empty, fixed in that clenched but indifferent grimace he always had now. His skin was schorched and over his whole body laid a thick layer of dust and dirt. His long curls was disheveld and tangled around the now very sharp angles of his face, the wildly grown beard adding to the image of a broken man. Link knew he looked somewhat similiar.

 

The base looked like all the other bases they've come upon during their journey. Blasted into the mountain wall, big steel doors and a sign with numbers above. Two armed guards on either side.

Link remebered how amazed he was when the first one's started to pop up (though a little different in construction depending on the landscape), how fast the organisation and building of it went even when humanity and civilasation as they knew it had been torn apart. He'd been so curious of it all, asked around how they managed it and what kind of communication there were (was there some way to get hold of bases far away, or people, or sending messages?) Now he didn't care anymore. They were just means for them to get forward, safespaces where they could refuel and get the small amount of information they could. (Yes NC state is still far away, no we haven't got any information about individual survivers there, yes the bases work the same and the radiation levels are pretty high south of the border.) Some distances they'd even had the luck to get a ride with some of the workers or guards going between bases.

 

Link payed no mind to the routines they went thorugh, they were the same for all the places. They were questioned (names, where they came from, where they were going and so on), ushered to the medical facility where all kinds of tests were taken. Link glanced over at Rhett when the doctor (a blonde woman with a kind smile) stated his radiation- levels, knowing that it had went from high to alarmingly high, though still at a manageble level (she sneaked him some extra pills than the usual ranson when he mentioned they were just passing thorugh, looking for their families). Rhett didn't seem to have heard, for wich Link was glad. Now that he thought of it, maybe that was when his best friend started to turn in on himself. Some week or so (it was hard to keep track of the days) after Stevie, in the same kind of steril medical room as now, when the doctor (an old man that time) told them in a matter- of- factly- manner that Link's levels showed signs of increase and that it'd soon start the down- breaking progress of his body. Link knew that the both of them thought of Stevie in that moment, how she had her life sucked out of her, how everything in her just slowly shut off.

 

When Link put the pills in his pocket, making sure Rhett didn't see, he felt a strange sense of calm. It didn't have to go that way for him. There was hope, there was always hope.

 

They were served food in the big dining room wich was filled to the brink with people. Neither man aknowledged any of the others at their table. In Link's head, the high noise level turned into a muffled buzz, as if he was under water. The soup tasted of nothing as always but it was warm and Link could feel some new energy seep into his body. He looked at Rhett. He was staring down into his half- finnished bowl but made no move to continue eating. Link stretched out his hand to grace Rhett's knuckles.

”Aren't you gonna eat?” He said with the coarse, raspy sound that was his voice nowadays. Rhett didn't look up. Link searched for clues in the face he'd known for so long. The perky cheeks gone hollow and the golden skin now a washed out grey, patched with blazing red sunburns. _I miss you_ , Link surprised himself with thinking, not allowing himself to feel such thing for so long. It never helped, it didn't get them anywhere to long for times that had been and that never would be again. But now Link couldn't help to take hold of Rhett's calloused hand and squeeze, feeling a rush of despair boiling up inside. He thought of Rhett's laugh and how he almost couldn't remeber how it sounded. He thought of that quirked eyebrow and how he used to go on and on about stuff he thought he knew everything about. He thought about the soft gaze that Rhett sometimes looked at Link with, that had made him feel like he truly was someone, that he mattered.

 

He didn't think of his family anymore, he was going to find them but he couldn't think of them – they were to far away, out of his reach. But Rhett was here, at the same time as he was not, and Link could have given everything (though what did that even mean when he had nothing) to hear him laugh again. _I miss us._

 

Rhett withdrew his hand, shrugged. When he stood up from the table, leaving his food behind, Link thought of how there definitely was less and less hope, if any, left.

 

***

 

”You and your boyfriend can take the corner bunk”, the guard that had given them the usual clean cotton clothes after their shower, gestured towards an empty bed in the far- away corner of the crowded room.

”We're not ...” Link opened his mouth without even thinking about it, but got cut of immidietly.

”Listen, I don't care what you are. You're noobies and noobies get to share bunk if there's no space. Wich, there isn't if you haven't noticed.” The man made a gesture towards the people running back and forth, shuffling around on matresses and benches, the room filled to the brink with men, women and children. Link shrugged, not caring to clear up that it wasn't his intention to argue. He was fine sleeping close to Rhett. They'd done it a lot during this journey, both at the bases and while outside, for warmth or for comfort. Though it was long ago now, the nights had gotten warmer and with Rhett's growing distance, they usually ended up pretty far away from each other. Sometimes it felt like the whole desert laid between them. Link remebered how ashamed he'd been the first couple of weeks, when he clinged to Rhett's big frame, his face burrowed in his chest, shaking with choked sobs, almost every night. Stevie was the one who should have been like that, he thought, she was so young and she had no hope of finding her family or Cassie. They'd been to close to one of the impact- areas. And if there was something they knew, it was that no one had survived that.

 

Link asked wether Rhett preferred sleeping next to the wall or at the edge, to wich he answered by just shrugging. Link then waited for him to get in, settling his big frame as close to the wall as he could, facing it. Link almost rolled his eyes but the annoyance got overpowered by the sadness and so he just got in beside his friend, splayed the thin woolblanket over them both and laid down on his side, watching Rhett's silouette in the dim lighting.

 

Usually Link fell asleep pretty fast, mind and body exhausted and longing for the dark calm of sleep. Now, he laid listening to the whispers around him, the rustling of blankets, snores and moving bodies. His gaze fixed upon Rhett's freckled shoulders, mind blank. Thats why he saw when he started to shake. How the big man curled in on himself, trying to choke back the sobs, his whole body convulsing. For a moment Link just watched, the centimetres between them feeling like a thousand miles. Or as if Rhett was laying in this bunk all by himself and Link was just a ghost, a fleeting memory that lingered.

 

Then he reached out. Splayed one of his palms out on Rhett's sharp shoulderblade, expecting him to withdraw, inching even further away and melt into the wall. But, after a shuddering breath, Rhett pressed back, into Link's touch. Link bit his lip, felt tears form in the corner of his eyes by the simple motion.

 

When Rhett turned around, Link's sight became hazy because he _looked_ at him. Rhett looked him in the eye and Link realized in that moment that he couldn't remeber the last time that happened. He blinked, saw the utter despair, loud and clear in Rhett's whole being. If they'd been alone, under the now non- existent stars, Link would have tried to voice everything he suddenly wanted to say. For so long he'd been without words, without thoughts. Now he wrapped his arms around the shaking body of his life- long friend and he wanted to tell him all their childhood stories over and over again, reminding both of them of everything that had made them, _them._ He wanted to tell Rhett how grateful he was for all of it. Now and then.

 

_I am so lucky. So lucky that you choose me. You had so much, so many things I didn't have. A family that was whole, friends, confidence and you choose to be mine. My best friend. You saved me. You've saved me so many times. You've given me so much. You're barely carrying yourself but still you're carrying me through everything, even now – even with what you've become. Because I know you, I know who you are, who you've been and what you can be. You're not lost because if you were, then I'd be too and I'm not. We're not. And we never will be as long as we're here together._

 

With all the people around them, Link was left to translate it all into his touch. He squeezed Rhett's arm, telling him:

_I'm here._

He slid his hand up along the bearded cheek, brushing away hair and caressing his face:

_It will be okay._

He scooted closer, laced their fingers together:

_I will always be here_

Now, temple against temple, Link looked into Rhett's eyes, blinked away the tears that run freely down his cheeks. In the greyish green, glazed over with tears he heard:

_I can't do this._

And Link nudged Rhett's nose with his own:

_Yes you can._

He squeezed his hand:

_We can._

They were both sobbing now, trying to swallow the sounds down, making their bodies shudder against each other.

”We will find them, okay bo?” Link whispered. ”You and I.”

And then. Breath ghosting against dry, cracked lips. Both looked down. Rhett swallowed, closed his eyes for a moment.

”I love you.” It was the first words he'd said in a long time and the sound of his deep, but hoarse voice, made Link close the small distance between them, surging forward in an act to get closer, closer, closer.

 

There was no lust in the kiss, no desperation, no pent- up feelings welling up over the brim. It was simply another wordless reassurance. Rhett held on to Link's waist, Link let his fingers get lost in the locks at the nape of Rhett's neck. The kiss tasted of salt and sand.

 

When they withdrew from it, Rhett nestled into Link's neck and Link placed another soft kiss att his temple.

”I love you too”, he whispered, a ghost of a smile against Rhett's skin.

 

And somwhere in that there was hope. Beacause there's always hope.

 

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you so much for reading. Be my friend on tumblr @mythicalpatterns  
> Take care of yourself and the people around you <3


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